Study Is Hard Work

This is the best guide ever published on how to acquire and maintain good study skills. It covers everything from developing a vocabulary to improving the quality of written work, and has chapters on studying math, science, and languages; taking tests; and using libraries. If anyone you know is college-bound, buy this book: it will prove a lifesaver and a godsend.

Praise for Study Is Hard Work

This uncompromising title foreshadows the clarity and honesty contained within . . . The student who reads [this] carefully will be prepared not merely for success in school, but for something far more important: a life of self-fulfillment. David R. Godine is to be praised for bringing this remarkable book before the public in a new edition.
—John R. Silber, Former President, Boston University

He speaks truthfully about the discipline required for learning, and about the pleasures of order and system in acquiring knowledge. Any reader, of any age, will enjoy this book.
—Jill Ker Conway, Author and Former President, Smith College

There is much to admire in this wonderfully commonsensical book. The optimistic, and realistic, assumption that learning is accessible to the ambitious, that one can learn how to learn, underlies a kind of democratic scholasticism. Mr. Armstrong knows that the bright futures belong to students who make the effort. The modest effort required to read this practical little book should be handsomely repaid, in school and in life.
—Marlyn McGrath, Director of Admissions, Harvard and Radcliffe Colleges

William H. Armstrong is best known for his Newbery Medal-winning novel Sounder, but he also enjoyed a long career as a respected educator. For over fifty years, he taught history and general studies at the prestigious Kent School in Connecticut. He based his first book, Study Is Hard Work, on his experience with ninth graders at Kent. He published fifteen other books over the course of the career, many of which remain perennial classics.